1. Field of the Invention
The invention relates to an oven having a cooking chamber in which food is received for cooking, and more particularly, to an oven in combination with a refrigeration unit for cooling the cooking chamber to permit the refrigerated storage of food within the cooking chamber until it is desired to begin the cooking of the food.
2. Description of the Related Art
Ovens for cooking or baking foods are ubiquitous. While various ovens may have a variety of different features and cooking cycles, almost every contemporary oven includes a cooking chamber for receiving the food to be cooked and a heat source for heating the cooking chamber to a user-selected cooking temperature for a user-selected time-period. The heat source is normally one or more electric or gas heating elements positioned within the cooking chamber. Some ovens use a magnetron to generate microwaves as the heat source. A variety of controllers, including user input devices and displays, enable the user to input the preferred cooking temperature and cooking time.
A common cooking cycle is a Time-Bake cycle where the user can control the start time and stop time of the cooking cycle. A common application for the Time-Bake cycle is for cooking food while the user is away from the home, such as at work, and the cooking of the food will be completed at the anticipated arrival of the user at home, such as when the user returns home from work. The advantage of a Time-Bake cycle is that the user can cook the food without being present and have the food ready upon the user's anticipated time of arrival.
A disadvantage of the use of a Time-Bake cycle with an oven lies in that the cooking time for most food is substantially less than the amount of time the user is away, necessitating that the food be placed in the cooking chamber several hours before the start time of the cooking cycle. For example, most foods are cooked within 2-3 hours while most users work a traditional 8-hour day, excluding commute time, which requires that the food be placed in the cooking chamber at least five hours prior to the start time of the Time-Bake cycle. Not all food can be placed in the oven for long time periods without spoiling. Many types of food suitable for cooking in the oven require continuous refrigeration prior to cooking. These foods can spoil prior to the initiation of the start time of the Time-Bake cycle.
An attempt to solve the problem of food spoiling while placed in the cooking chamber during the delay prior to the start of the Time-Bake cycle included the addition of a refrigeration unit with the oven to cool the cooking chamber prior to the initiation of the bake cycle. Such a combination refrigerator oven is disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 4,884,626 to Filipowski.
While previous refrigerated ovens attempt to address the problem of preventing the food from spoiling before the initiation of the bake cycle, they do not address the problem of maintaining the cooked food at a temperature suitable for serving after the completion of the Time-Bake cycle, which can result in the need to warm the cooked food if the user does not remove and serve the food immediately at the completion of the bake cycle, such as when the user unexpectedly had to work late or was delayed in arriving home.
There is an unfilled need for a refrigerated oven that not only protects the food from spoiling, both before and after the bake cycle, but also maintains the cooked food at a temperature suitable for serving after the completion of the bake cycle.
In addition to the shortcomings associated with the various cooking cycles, prior refrigerated ovens have structural shortcomings related to the inherent difficulties of combining a traditional refrigeration system with a traditional oven, which have antithetical functions: one heats and one cools. These problems can vary and most notably include: the difficulty of transferring the chilled air from the refrigeration unit into the cooking chamber, finding sufficient space in the standard-size oven for the refrigeration unit, and providing easy access to the refrigeration unit for maintenance.
An especially difficult problem related to incorporating a refrigeration unit with an oven is protecting the refrigeration system and its components from the high heat generated by the oven. This problem is exacerbated by the high temperatures attained during an oven cleaning cycle; these temperatures are approximately 850° F. Such heat creates an environment capable of damaging or negatively impacting the performance of a traditional refrigeration unit. For example, the temperature surrounding the refrigeration unit can be sufficiently great enough to negatively impact a traditional refrigeration system, which greatly reduces the life of the refrigeration unit or may cause the system to prematurely fail. Thus, the refrigeration unit must be capable of functioning properly when placed in close proximity to the self-cleaning oven.